I'm a 24 year old male, recent BSN graduate, obtained my RN license this month. I've applied to 20 RN & GNP (Graduate Nurse Permit) positions within 7 different hospitals in my city and surrounding cities (I applied for about 3 positions per facility). It has been 3 and a half weeks since my applications have been submitted and all 20 application statuses online either say "closed" (yes I know closed means the positions have been filled) or "un-qualified" or "pending".
Keep in mind, all 20 nursing positions I applied for have a minimum experience requirement of either "less than one year" or "graduate nurse" with a minimum education of an associates. No other requirements were posted. I met All desired preferences on every position I applied for with either ACLS certification and or education/ BSN and prior experience.
I have 6 letters of recommendation from either clinical site instructors and or nurse assistant professors at my university. I maintained the presidents list throughout nursing school and graduated with a cumulative GPA of 3.8. I have 700 clinical hours, 200 in critical care, 200 in med surg, 100 in Ob/peds. 100 in psych and 100 in community. (And yes all of this information and more is on my resume). I was also a nurse tech prior to nursing school and made sure to network during clinical rotations.
So why can't I get a job? I have a bachelors of science in nursing, 700 clinical hours, 3.8 GPA, I was in the SNA all throughout my program, volunteered at local children's hospital during my breaks, recent RN license, 6 letters of recommendation for hire, I've made sure to apply for positions that are for graduate nurses or RNs with less than 1 year of experience.
I've even made the effort to meet with unit managers in person that were hiring, even gave a few a hard copies of my resume and recommendation letters to them directly and bypassing HR. Still, nothing!
I'm just bent over backwards at the fact that everyone keeps saying "nursing is in so high demand right now, you will get a job so fast bla bla bla" when in reality it's been 3 and a half weeks since I've applied for 20 positions and not a single call back. All of the other open RN positions are for either charge nurse or require a minimum of 2-3 years experience so I can't apply for the others ones.
Why can't I get a job? What am I doing wrong? Advice?
The city I live has over 12 nursing programs, so my area has more than plenty enough new grads.
And it takes months sometimes for HR to come across a resume. My current job, which I didn't even apply for, came about from applying to another position about 6-9 months prior to receiving a call for an interview. HR and Nursing managers work at their own sweet pace.
This sounds like my experience. Applied for some positions in Feb, and got generic "considering internal candidate" reply emails. Then they contacted me in April to interview for a new grad residency. Turns out, someone liked my application materials, but they don't hire new grads except through the residency program, which was not recruiting when I was applying. So, I interviewed in April, got a "soft" job offer on the spot (including start dates and scrub buying instructions), then waited 3 weeks for HR to send the formal offer, which I accepted. Since by now my pregnancy is too far advanced, I can't start with this class, so I'll have to wait until the end of August when a new orientation starts. It's all worked out, but that's 7 months from passing my NCLEX to start date - and that's with a hospital that wanted me.
OP, I think there's nothing wrong with you but your expectations. This isn't like applying to McDonalds where you can apply today and start tomorrow. HR is going through literally hundreds (or even thousands) of applications. It just takes time. You are in a hurry. HR is not.
Now of course it happens that someone gets an interview, gets an offer nearly immediately, and starts a week or two later. But that's pretty rare, and more a function of luck than anything else. Usually it means the person applied close to the time HR was ready to finalize hiring and the next orientation was scheduled. How fast the process goes is not a matter of the candidate's qualifications, but the organization's needs.
I think it depends on where you live? I didn't any problem finding a job. I was shocked. Almost every place I applied called me back. I have read so many posts here about difficulty finding jobs that I expected it to be harder. I'm good at interviewing and resumes. I of course am struggling with the actual job part now which is irony, but certain regions of the country are harder to find jobs than others. Also, I'd definitely take a look at your resume and cover letter. I tweaked, and tweaked, and tweaked my resume and nailed down my cover letter too.
Basically it's a math problem. Too many applicants and not enough jobs. Limiting your search to just hospitals could be a part of it too. You need to apply everywhere.
Specializes in Management, Med/Surg, Clinical Trainer.
As others have said, do take the clinical hours off of your resume. The GPA is okay, but that just screams new grad...so use the GPA only when applying for new grad programs.
It is a tough time out there for new grads and frankly nursing in general. You will get a job....it will just take time.
Specializes in Psych, Addictions, SOL (Student of Life).
You've only been lloking for 3 weeks? Even when there was a nursing shortage for real back in the early 2000's it still took more than three weeks to land that coveted first job. When I found myself out of work last year with 12 years of experience it took me 4 months to get a job. No matter what you have been told there is no shortage of nurses and competition is stiff. The economy still sucks and there are tons of people out of work if you don't get into the big hospitals right away then be flexible and look around. Be willing to consider LTC, Dialysis, psych erc.... You never know where these jobs might take you and it's always easier to find a job when you have one.
Six letters of recommendation seems like overkill why do you feel you need so many? Some people have applied to 50-100+ jobs and it has taken over a year to get a job and you are fretting over a few weeks. Where do you live, certain areas have an overabundance of RN's such as California and NYC. Some cities have seen hospitals closing over poor finances so you may be competing with experienced nurses and who knows how many new grads. How many colleges are in your city? Probably a dozen or more, graduating nurses twice a year so you have a lot of competition! You come across as too aggressive and while your clinical hours are a lot, don't all the other nurses in your class have the same amount? As a nurse tech the first place to look is where you are currently working. Did you talk to the manager where you are working. That is the best place to begin. If no jobs available, at least get a reference from your manager and see if they have any contacts of available jobs in other departments in the hospital, the hospital system or other hospitals. While I think six references is too much, I think a reference from a manager where you are working combined with say a clinical instructor in the specialty you are interested in would be good. Think three references would be good and plenty. Just my opinion.
As a new grad myself i think it all depends on where you are applying. Did you do a preceptorship at a hospital and they really liked you? Did you do any clinicals where there was even an inkling that they would have a spot for you? I live in a very small community where you only get one chance to make an impression, i just passed the NCLEX last week and already have 1 job and one interview tomorrow for another job. How did i get those interviews so fast? I made an impression during my 2 month preceptorship and THEY CALLED ME to give me a job when there was an opening. And the other job a friend told me about and i turned in the application today and they wanted me to come back ASAP for an interview. My resume and cover letter are to the point. During school i worked at the big hospital in our town and when i applied it took them months to get me hired. The HR department is slow and backed up so don't worry if you're not getting a call back right away, it'll happen it just takes a long time to go through all the applications. Knowing people is also a foot in the door, it can expedite the process. I wish you luck and it will happen!
Pretty much what has been mentioned here before. One month is nothing, and you really should be applying for 20 positions at each hospital. They always said back in nursing school don't apply for a ton of jobs because they'll see you're desperate and give you the worst one, the one they are having trouble filling. Which might be true in some case but it is pretty much rubbish. The system I work for has separate recruiters for each area of care. The only way they know if you have applied for other areas is if they physically ask the other areas. also the float pool one from my system was like hey I see you applied for float pool, would you be interested in having me apply you for every float pool position we have available currently. Also I'm not sure if it's just here but generally, they only invite the first thirty or so applicants in for an interview. They figure they'll find someone who is fit for the position in those 30, and only look past those initial 30 if the director doesn't find someone or the person they find turns them down. So sit on their job websites, sit on a general job website and get your apps in fast.
as for the resume, because I float, I track what units I work on and what percentage that I work on them. Mainly because in the event I want to move to the ICU at another hospital in our out of the system I can say yes i flosted, but 40% of the time I was in the icu. Otherwise the hospitals don't care that you spent one day in another hospitals pacu or where you had your clinical rotations.
While there technically isn't s nursing shortage hospitals are always working short. Don't be afraid of taking a PT job, you're always going to get extra shift opportunities.
As an aide I took a prn job that was listed as 16 hours every other week. It was rare when I didn't get 36-40 hours a week there. Same goes for nursing. I work 36 a week and i get emails and phone calls daily asking if I'll pick up extra.
As for my war story I worked at 2 hospitals as an aide(at the same time before graduation), had a previous degree in psychology, had a great preceptorship experience(my preceptor walked me into the directors office and told her to hire me) on a very prestigious unit. With all that it took 8 months to find a job, had one interview at both the hospitals I worked at as an aide, and never got an interview for any psych nursing jobs(not that I really wanted one, but I was desperate).
Things will work out, just have to keep pushing and hope one day you have that moment where all that hard work was worth it.
turtlesRcool
718 Posts
This sounds like my experience. Applied for some positions in Feb, and got generic "considering internal candidate" reply emails. Then they contacted me in April to interview for a new grad residency. Turns out, someone liked my application materials, but they don't hire new grads except through the residency program, which was not recruiting when I was applying. So, I interviewed in April, got a "soft" job offer on the spot (including start dates and scrub buying instructions), then waited 3 weeks for HR to send the formal offer, which I accepted. Since by now my pregnancy is too far advanced, I can't start with this class, so I'll have to wait until the end of August when a new orientation starts. It's all worked out, but that's 7 months from passing my NCLEX to start date - and that's with a hospital that wanted me.
OP, I think there's nothing wrong with you but your expectations. This isn't like applying to McDonalds where you can apply today and start tomorrow. HR is going through literally hundreds (or even thousands) of applications. It just takes time. You are in a hurry. HR is not.
Now of course it happens that someone gets an interview, gets an offer nearly immediately, and starts a week or two later. But that's pretty rare, and more a function of luck than anything else. Usually it means the person applied close to the time HR was ready to finalize hiring and the next orientation was scheduled. How fast the process goes is not a matter of the candidate's qualifications, but the organization's needs.